00:02We are also expecting to see a real benefit for consumers in these fees being stripped
00:06out.
00:07The Reserve Bank estimates that it will be around $1.6 billion stripped out of surcharging
00:14for consumers and with that around $900 million taken out of the system in costs for businesses
00:21and the expectation is that small businesses will benefit from that in particular.
00:25So we're really supportive of this change, we think it's a great thing and something
00:28that's been a long time coming.
00:29I think what we have seen over the last few years is that everybody who pays with card,
00:34which is almost everybody, is essentially kind of cross-subsidising the reward schemes.
00:39I think it is a much fairer way to do things that if you want to be part of those
00:43reward
00:43schemes it's you that has to pay for it, not every single card user in Australia.
00:46This system is really outdated, so when surcharging was introduced originally in the early 2000s
00:52it was because there were so many fewer card transactions and card payments were so much
00:58more expensive to accept than cash was at that time, of course 25 years later everybody,
01:03almost everybody's using cards.
01:05Almost the opposite is true where it's now much more expensive to accept cash.
01:08So that's a big part of why the Reserve Bank has done this.
01:12The other thing I would say is if we do see that some prices go up a little bit to
01:17account
01:17for what would otherwise have been a surcharge, that's still a good result for consumers because
01:21we know what the price is up front, we don't get a surprise when we get to the till, I
01:26think
01:26most people would be much happier for that situation to take place.
Comments